The Jacqui and Gilly rape drama. It started out as an interesting storyline due to the fact that the rape drama was showed from both points of view, and that Hollyoaks fans were offered the chance to work behind the scenes to decide if Gilly would be found guilty or not. He wasn't, and the aftermath was dealt with in an impressively realistic manner. Then it went on. And on. And on. Episodes consisted of Jacqui bleating ''E' RAPED MEH' in the streets, and Gilly being tormented by most of his peers despite the fact he had been found innocent. While impressive drama, most viewers agreed that it went on for far too long.
Unfortunately, this storyline returned to the forefront of the show, on Gilly coming back to the village. Although it's Rhys, Jaqcui's other half, who is going around screaming that he raped her.
For some, Silas's reign of terror which has stretched out to almost a year now.
Stendan, the circles of abuse and Ste going back to Brendan without anything changing just to be abused. Again.
Similarly, Patrick abusing Maxine and people who figured it out conveniently forgetting.
Will acting like a victim in a wheelchair when he's actually murdered his fiancée and his own mother and can walk perfectly well. The only people who find out what he's really like tend to end up dead, and it's been going on for over a year now.
John Paul's rape storyline received this after just a few months due to escalating into an over the top chain of misery (including Finn scheming to get John Paul sent to jail, where he is caught up in Trevor's schemes) that viewers felt destroyed the realism that the show's producers claimed the story was designed to have.
The Trevor-Grace-Fraser gangster storyline
The aftermath of Theresa killing Calvin is this, because she stayed in the show for what seemed like an ice age with no real reprecussion about what she'd done except for the odd moments when there is (such as Kyle, who was framed for the murder, showing up for revenge). By 2011 everyone who knew the truth behind Calvin's death had just stopped caring, making it even stranger when Theresa finally is punished for it, as we are meant to believe that Carmel does care all of a sudden, when she's been acting like she's completely forgiven Theresa for it for approx four years.
Alternative Character Interpretation: A lot of Jacqui's behaviour, mood-swings and inability to go several sentences without screaming at someone for some slight, actually makes a lot more sense if you interpret her as having an undiagnosed case of severe manic-depression or borderline personality disorder.
The same is potentially applicable to Mercedes, who has a long history of unstable behaviour and Aesop Amnesia.
Is it true love that kept Ste returning to Brendan, despite all the emotional, psychological and physical abuse he's endured at his hands, or has it just turned him into a Love Martyr?
The conclusion to the Jacqui and Gilly rape storyline. Flashbacks were retconned so that Jacqui actually said 'no', while earlier she had testified in court that she hadn't actually said no. So a clever storyline that started out as both Gilly and Jacqui being right turned into a Gilly bashing session that saw him leave the village. Needless to say, even the viewers who disliked Gilly aren't happy.
The introduction of Esther Bloom as Frankie Osbourne's grandaughter, since her father is stated to have been Frankie's son. Who was never mentioned at all during Frankie's tenure on the show, despite her having four other children as characters on the show. Said son was the one Frankie had while she was just sixteen; her parents had told her he had died shortly after birth, while he had actually gone on to eventually father Esther.
Awesome Moments: One for the show itself: In 2007, an episode had the characters throw a party where the attendees start to get sick from some mystery ailment. The culprit is later discovered to be carbon monoxide poisoning. One of the episode's viewers was a woman who'd been suffering from a mystery ailment of her own and was too sick to go to work. Her doctors couldn't figure out what was wrong with her. While watching the episode, she noticed that the party attendees' symptoms were similar to her own and suggested she might be suffering from carbon monoxide poisoning to her doctors. She was later proved correct and received proper treatment. It was also determined that if she'd waited any longer to seek help, she would have died.
Similarly in 2020, the depression and suicide storyline involving Darren Osbourne and Kyle Kelly prevented at least one person from committing suicide and encouraged them to seek help.
Leanne Holiday. Fans hated her for breaking up the liked relationship between her ex Lee and Amy Barnes, which she never got comeuppance for. However, producer Paul Marquess considered her his favourite character. When a poll was run on who fans' favourite new character was from the 2010 class, she came last with 7%, and the next year when a poll asked who fans wanted to see fall victim to serial killer Silas Blissett note This poll featured just about every young woman in the cast, she got nearly 60% of the vote.
Ste Hay. Ste abused Amy for years, and has even hit his current boyfriend Harry out of anger, he takes drugs without thinking of the consequences, he's frequently violent and bad tempered and flies into a rage at the slightest provocation. He steals, then whines that no-one ever gives him a chance, he lashes out at people and is surprised when people think that he's a thug. Yet he's had countless redemption arcs throughout the series, and it's clear that the viewers are supposed to sympathise with him because he had a hard upbringing. One arc saw Ste trying to get custody of his children, despite being mentally and financially unfit to take care of them, and viewers were supposed to feel sorry for him when it didn't happen. Now he has the convenient excuse of 'blacking out' whenever he's violent, so that he can receive more sympathy. Ste also receives countless storylines, most of which revolve around him being a “victim” and his friends needing to rally around him to help him.
Warren Fox. He never seems to be mentioned among Hollyoaks' serial killers, but he's killed more onscreen than some of them, he's tried to kill others, including several of his loved ones, he thinks he deserves credit every time he's vaguely pleasant to someone and not only does the show allow him to get away with it and all his other crimes every single time, it keeps trying to present him a sympathetic character.
Designated Hero: One of Hollyoaks' main problems is that most of the main focus is on characters who are truly horrible human beings.
A good example comes in the storyline where Clare kidnapped, tortured and threatened to murder Mercedes and Paul. Given that Mercedes is a psychotic Femme Fatale and Paul is an unrepentant murderer, Clare could be argued to be actually the least villainous of them all.
Doug Carter is villainised beyond belief by some 'Stendan' fans. He's berated for acting like a normal, concerned fiancé when Ste gets tangled back up in Brendan's business, and with good reason too; Ste almost gets shot. Doug has his bad moments like anyone, but from listening to his bashers, you would think he was worse than the man who's a murderer and an abuser.
Any and all characters who come between John Paul McQueen and Craig Dean will get this, even if they are beloved before as poor Ste Hay can protest. This is probably the reason why whenever either of them briefly return to the show and depart, it will be written as the couple getting back together.
Silas, considered to be one of the most popular and interesting characters that ever appeared on the show. Oh and he's a 65-year-old serial killer.
Kevin Foster (not the same person as Kevin the alien) was surprisingly popular considering he was a fairly minor character.
Epileptic Trees: If one imagines Hollyoaks is actually an alien recreation of an extinct humanity, based entirely on salvaged copies of Heat magazine and Hello, it's surprising how much the plots and characters start to make sense.
Fan Nickname: Among those watching the show as a guilty pleasure worthy of mocking, anyway. Popular in forums, as some cast members are easily defined by one unique feature/personality trait; among them: "Speak n Spell" (Sasha), "Potato Head" (Zak), "Skoda" (Mercedes), "Bitchtits" (Justin), "Dull & Duller" (Tina and Dom), "Spock" (Ste), "Easter Island"/"Angry Pederast" (Warren), "Rubbish Tranny" (Kris), "Fruit Loops" (Sienna), "Non-Robbie" (Jason Roscoe), "Hypnotoad" (Freddie), "Giant" Holly, "Sheep Head" (Tom), "Clip Clop" (Gabby), "Knock Knock" (Noah Baxter)
And, of course, Hottyoaks for the show itself.
Ever since producer Bryan Kirkwood's decision to switch the show's focus to the hospital rather than the university, Holbyoaks has become a common one.
Fan-Preferred Couple: A good number of fans want Lily to get together with Tom, rather than with Prince.
Fanon Discontinuity: John Paul McQueen's return in 2012 is this. Not only this breaks up the Fan-Preferred Couple John Paul/Craig, the storyline of his return (as detailed in Arc Fatigue) is so drag out that even non-shippers of the couple declare this.
Hilarious in Hindsight: Sinead once openly mocked Jaqcui McQueen's fashion sense to the point of almost breaking up with Jacqui's cousin Bart over it. Few months down the line and Sinead's sense of style is the exact same as hers, tacky leather trousers, animal print tops, scraped back hair and all.
Ho Yay: The early days had a lot of this. Kurt Benson (Jeremy Edwards) and Jambo Bolton (Will Mellor) spent rather a lot of time together topless and standing close to another.
Parodied when Hannah once kissed Nancy in the nightclub after being told by Lydia and Sarah (a lesbian couple) that she wasn't adventurous enough. Nancy then complained about being used as an experiment.
Memetic Mutation: Gabby stomping across a tiled floor, Noah banging on a door. AJ and Curtis Pritchard's infamous shortlived stint on the show.
Moment of Awesome: Louise dressed all in black making a dramatic entrance to interrupt the wedding of Mercedes and Russ to reveal that Mercedes had slept with Warren.
More Popular Replacement: Jessamy Stoddart as Liberty Savage. Frankly, she's a much better actress than the first Liberty, Abi Philips. Liberty has also had more comedy and Woobie moments since Jessamy Stoddart took over, and she works well when paired with her half-sister Sienna.
Jude Monk McGowan as Liam Donovan. His version of the character lasted a bit longer than the first actor Maxim Baldry, and had a much more interesting personality and was more involved with storylines and had more of a fanbase.
Narm: Texas' tragic death by defenestration. Due to the magic of slow-motion, the three seconds it should take to fall from a second storey window, gets stretched out to nearly half a minute and as a result, accidentally goes from horrifying to almost hilarious in how over the top it's played.
Sarah Barnes dies when she goes parachuting & both parachutes fail. As she plummets to the ground, the camera stays with her for several minutes as she realises she's going to die & helplessly screams for help. The camera only cuts away several seconds before impact.
This scene is made even worse when the camera pulls back, and if you've got a sharp eye, you can see blood staining the stalks of corn in the field where she fell, and covering quite a wide area.
Rae is strangled by Silas just feet away from where her friend Theresa and crush Will are kissing. She tries to call out for help, but can't.
Portmanteau Couple Name: Jacqui's actress coined one for the relationship between her character and Rhys Ashworth; Ja-Rhys
In universe, Lee comes up with 'Lamy' for him and Amy.
Also in universe, Esther comes up with 'Rono' for Ruby and Jono.
There's 'Stendan' for Ste/Brendan, and 'Stug' has become the name for Ste/Doug.
And 'McHay' for Ste/John-Paul.
'Frinead' (Freddie/Sinead) and 'Frindsey' (Freddie/Lindsey) were used when Freddie's brief marriage to Sinead was threatened by his feelings for Lindsey. The production team encouraged this and used them on the show's official sites.
Replacement Scrappy: What some fans think of Grace Black compared to her sister Clare.
Rescued from the Scrappy Heap: For many, Ruby was redeemed for her past behaviour due to how badly she was treated by Maddie for no good reason. Some even want her bitchy behaviour to return, just so she can get even.
Phoebe has gained some popularity after being helpful to her surrogate mother figure Jacqui, by calmly dealing with finding an unconscious and bleeding Carmel in the house when Jacqui is too shocked and upset to think clearly, and for trying to help Jacqui and Rhys sort out their relationship.
Phoebe also won major points by sticking up for Esther when no-one else would. She also attacked Maddie for bullying Esther, and has even threatened to go further if Maddie just doesn't back off.
Leanne is becoming increasingly popular since the writers realised her comedy potential and evolved her into The Ditz. So that's three Scrappies who they've managed to rescue. Hollyoaks are good at one thing at least.
Rooting for the Empire: Due to many of the characters being insufferable or villainous at the best of times, many people where actively rooting for Silas during his killing spree. To the point where at least one magazine even ran a poll asking which annoying character the viewers wanted most to die!
A poll from Inside Soap asked readers who they would prefer to survive Silas's reign of terror, and who they they wanted to die. Leanne and Ruby Button were the most voted to be his next victim.
Fans were left extremely disappointed when Sinead didn't die in the 2013 explosion.
Glenn Donovan might have been a villain, but he was still a particularly charmless, unpopular one who had an affair with his daughter-in-law Maxine, later murdered his son Adam and made sure his body was dumped in front of Adam's wife Maxine. Glenn was also a domestic abuser towards his girlfriend Grace. Glenn was even a Scrappy in-universe, as a large chunk of the village population grouped togeather to plan to kill him! He was eventually killed by serial killer Breda.
Edward Hutchinson. One of the earliest things Edward did on the show was crush a baby bird to death. Edward tries to destroy his son Tony by making him think he has various illnesses and pushes him out of his own family home, all so he can get Tony to divorce his wife Diane, as Edward wants to marry her himself! He also tries to change Diane into a clone of his own dead wife! In fact, you could even argue this whole storyline was a Scrappy, fans hated it!
Values Dissonance: Lucy Benson boasts of 'curing' her boyfriend Baz of his homosexuality. Furthermore, when she catches him cheating on her with another man, it is ambiguous as to whether she is more angry that he was unfaithful per se or that the affair was a homosexual one.
Hannah Ashworth definitely qualified. She suffered from an eating disorder and tried subtly to talk to her friends about it, but they didn't notice. She was deeply in love with her boyfriend John Paul, but he was struggling to come to terms with being gay. Hannah later befriended Melissa, another girl with an eating disorder, and saw Melissa die right in front of her. Then there's her being sectioned, finding out about her best friend Sarah's death, almost dying herself in a fire... and that's not even a complete list!
Esther, oh poor Esther! The poor girl can't seem to catch a break, especially when Maddie starts to spread rumours about her, and then acts innocent when Esther calls her on it. And punches her. Then you get the normally laid back Darren blaming her for Jack's heart attack, when it was just a case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Then Esther ends up in situations where she's picked on, somehow ends up with her underwear showing, and is filmed and the resulting video is put on YouTube.
It manages to get even worse after Esther's main tormentor is killed; Esther is instead blamed for the crash that killed her, and is tormented further by Ruby and Sinead. The entire school turns against her, her own grandparents believe Ruby, a known liar, over her, and there are no adults on her side whatsoever. The only people to stick up for Esther are Tilly, George and Phoebe, and even then teachers refuse to believe that Esther is being bullied when bottles of piss are thrown at her in the corridors on a regular occasion. Then Esther tries to kill herself.
Tom Cunningham. In order, his father, mother, baby niece, older brother/surrogate father figure, and sister-in-law/surrogate mother figure all die, his parents within weeks of one another; his widowed sister-in-law's second husband & Tom's second surrogate father figure is accused (But eventually cleared) of rape, but leaves the village anyway following the Retcon that he did commit rape. And all before he's hit puberty. Then another potential father figure, Darren, is tricked into believing he's nothing but a little pervert and a liar, and left him for a long time, which only really ended after what could have escalated easily into an attempt on his life and his being kidnapped for months due to finding out that Sienna wasn't really pregnant. Then the girl he has a crush on gets a brain tumour and refuses to have surgery, although he sorts that one out. Made worse by the fact that, unlike most characters, the only really bad thing he's other done (frame Sienna for stealing a baby, with the fairly understandable motive that she was let off on bail after kidnapping him) he went to the police and owned up for (also denying Perri's involvement, as she wouldn't have had any real excuse) it.
Sid Sumner. His mother died when he was a child, he was mostly raised by his father Stuart, who was a far-right extremist who beat Sid. Sid ended up pushing Stuart off a cliff to stop him from killing Ste, but that ended up killing Stuart, which traumatised Sid. He was them homeless for a bit. He's been mugged several times, his cousin Jordan got him into drug dealing. Sid was deeply in love with girlfriend Juliet, only for his heart to be broken when she turned out to be a lesbian, but he was still completely supportive of her. He often tried to get Juliet and Jordan out of trouble, but would end up getting hurt himself. He overdosed on ketamine after several problems got on top of him, which led to him being in a car accident which meant his leg had to be amputated. Jordan, Sid's only remaining biological family member, was murdered, and Sid himself ended up being stabbed while trying to get evidence to the police to bring Victor down and get Juliet out of prison. Not only is this not the full list, everything after his father's death happened to him in JUST OVER A YEAR!
